Deciding What You Want
by prettylittleezria
Summary: A new twist in Ezra and Aria's relationship leaves everyone confused... Will the two figure out what they want before it's too late? Starts at 5x05.


"Hey!" I told Ezra as I walked into his apartment.

"Hey." He said back to me.

"Look, I know that there's no more -A, but you should seriously still lock your door." I said, handing him the pie.

"You stopped by Paula's." He said, looking pleasantly surprised.

"Yeah, it's key lime."

"Why pie?" Because the last time we had pie, I was really happy. I miss that.

"Why not pie?" I retorted, grabbing us some forks. "Jenna's all alone now. She's all alone and she's blaming herself. I just wanted to tell her that she should blame me." I took a small bite of the pie.

"You should both be blaming Shana. She was the one holding the gum, remember?" Ezra said, wiping some stray whipped cream off my mouth and licking his finger. Habit, I guess.

I touched my mouth, feeling where his hand was.

"I mean, Ali always thought that Jenna was manipulating Shana, but I think that Jenna actually loved her."

"Aria," he said. "You have to stop beating yourself up for this.

"I don't know how I'm going to get past it." I told him honestly.

He stood up, lifting up his shirt as I finally saw the wound from when he risked his life to save us.

"Do you see this? This is what she did to me. I'm lucky to be alive and so are you."

Ezra let his shirt fall back down as he said, "Just like she told you. Remember?"

Seeing the scar once was surreal. I had to see it again. I needed to see it again.

I pulled his shirt up over his scar, and ran my hands over it. Just like that, all the pain and anger I had towards Ezra washed away. He had saved us from death. And he loved me.

"I'm so sorry." I said, looking at him with a kind of intensity I'd never looked at him with before.

He pulled me out of my chair, looking at me the same way.

"I don't ever want to hear you say you're sorry again." And then his lips were on mine, and I was kissing him back.

Kissing Ezra was a million times different than kissing Riley, or even Jake.

Kissing Jake was bland, with no emotion. Although I'd never admit this to Riley, when I kissed him I pretended it was Ezra.

And kissing Ezra was a million times better. There was a spark of electricity, like fireworks when we kissed.

And then he was lifting me on the counter like he'd done it forever. Well, he kind of had.

He moved his lips down to my neck and I grasped the back of his.

Ezra looked at me and kissed me again, taking my jacket off.

He started picking me up to move me to the bed, and it shocked me.

That even with a gunshot wound he could lift me so effortlessly, so calmly.

No one would think that under Mr. Fitz's oxfords, suits, and ties was a body every guy desired to have and every girl craved.

Even more fit than Toby, Ezra had the body of a runner. He ran everyday, though recently he hadn't been working out because of the shooting. And I could tell before he was shot he's been working out a lot- his arms were more defined and his abs more toned.

I could tell me looking at his scar made him uncomfortable, so I looked into his eyes instead.

I pulled back and we both undressed quickly, ready to move on from everything we'd been through.

An hour later I awoke to a very shirtless Ezra. He was rubbing my shoulder gently, lovingly.

"Hey." He said, looking down at me.

"Hi." I replied, running my fingertips in circles above his scar.

"Look, Aria-" He started.

I cut him off by kissing him as the passion overtook us again.

The next morning, I woke up to the smell of fresh coffee, like I do every morning. I sat up in my bed and stretched.

Only then did I remember I wasn't in my bed. I was in Ezra's- and I was devoid of clothes. I quickly pulled on the first thing that I saw, which happened to be his shirt.

"Hi." He told me, grinning.

"Hey," I responded.

"You have some clothes in your drawer." Ezra said.

I had a drawer where my clothes were for situations like this, but I didn't think he'd still keep my clothes there.

I gestured to the bathroom.

"Yeah, go for it." He said.

I got a blue animal print dress with a zipper in the front, and tried to work on my tangled mess of hair when I saw a huge hickey on the right side of my neck.

"Shit. Ezra!" I called him, and he was right at the door.

"What's wrong?" He asked.

"Do you still have my makeup in here? I need a hell of a lot of concealer to hide this hickey."

He handed it to me, watching as I put it on and braided my hair over it.

"Look, I need to get to school. But we'll talk about this later, okay?" I told him.

"Are you okay? You don't.. regret anything?"

"I honestly don't think that we should get hung up on last night." I said, hating the pained look on his face.

"Well." Ezra said. "At least take some coffee. I made it for you."

He's such a gentleman. I grabbed some saying, "I love-" shit. That wasn't planned. "I love that you made me coffee. Thank you." God. I am SUCH an idiot.

He smiled, knowing what I meant. "Bye." I said, rushing out the door.

I shut the door, mentally beating myself up.

Great, Aria. One- well, two flings and I'm telling him I love him.

The whole day, I said nothing about what happened the night before. I needed time to think about Ezra, about what to do. About what we were.

I decided to think about it later. I headed straight to his apartment and planned to talk to him.

As soon as he opened the door, though, I practically pounced on him. I kissed him so fiercely I thought he'd want to stop.

I tangled my hands in his hair as he ran hid hands through mine. I pulled up his shirt and he broke the kiss to yank it over his head.

Then he turned me around and placed kisses on my neck and I knew I was going to have another hickey tomorrow as he unzipped my dress from behind me.

My phone beeped and I ignored it, turning around in only my underwear to kiss Ezra. But it kept buzzing. I groaned and looked at it. It was an SOS from Emily.

"Shit. Ezra, we have to leave- now. We're going to Emily's." He didn't ask questions, just put on an oxford shirt on while I did the same with my dress.

"I'll drive." He told me.

"You're not driving anywhere." I said.

"Aria-" I cut him off.

"Keys." He reluctantly handed over the keys as I grabbed my bag and shut the door.

As we drove, it was silent. We both just wanted to enjoy this little fantasy where we were happy.

As we pulled into Emily's driveway, I leaned over and pecked his lips.

"Thank you. For showing up on that roof. You saved us, and you helped me forgive myself." Ezra nodded, then put his hand on my face as he leaned over and kissed me.

I pulled back quickly. "We should go in."

He looked disappointed, and it broke my heart. I helped him out of the car and we walked in.

Four faces stared at us, confused, but they didn't comment. Spencer looked at me and raised her eyebrows, but I ignored her.

We sat down and Hanna and Caleb walked in. All eyes were on the television as they were about to reveal the name of the person in Alison's grave.

Ezra reached his hand out and my right hand locked with his left while my left hand rested on his arm.

The rest of the night was a blur, but I know it ended after Toby's house blew up and I took Ezra home. And that A was back. I drove my car back to the house, hating that I was alone... again.


End file.
